Notes

"The dominicans were naturally at the centre of this tradition, and in Johannes Romberch, a German, and Cosmas Rosellius, a Florentine, we have two Dominicans who wrote books on memory, small in format but packed with detail, apparently intended to make the Dominican art of memory generally known ... [in this work Rosellius]divides hell into eleven places, as illustrated in his diagram of Hell as a memory place system... Rossellius also envisages the constellations as memory place systems, of course mentioning Metrodorus of Scepsis in connection with the zodiacal place system. A feature of Rossellius's book are the mnemonic verses given to help memorise orders of places, whether orders of places in Hell, or the order of the signs of the zodiac. These verses are by a fellow Dominican who is also an inquisitor. These 'carmina' by an Inquisitor give an impressive air of great orthodoxy to the artificial memory...". (Yates)".